Summary

Gutenberg's invention of the printing press heralded a new era of
information sharing that resulted in the Renaissance in Europe,
fundamentally changing the structure of society.

With the arrival and mass adoption of the internet we are living
through a new, global renaissance.

The internet has allowed communication and information sharing on a
whole new level. We are witnessing extremely rapid change and
development in the world.

A key driver of this renaissance has been the free and open source
software movement. Indeed, free and open software has been critical
to the success of the internet. At the same time, the internet itself
has facilitated the development of free software by providing a means
for developers to collaborate on their projects.

This rapid change is very disruptive, threatening long established
business models. Technological advances such as driverless vehicles,
robots and artificial intelligence have the potential to replace many
existing jobs. Some commentators suggest 40% of current jobs are
under threat.

This rapid change presents particular challenges for Bermuda, a small
island jurisdiction that has traditionally been slow to change.

I am actually quite optimistic that the threat of a jobless future will
not turn out to be as bad as many fear. Further, I think Bermuda has
some unique opportunities to be a model that the rest of the world will
want to follow.

The very free software and open culture that is driving all this
change presents great opportunities for Bermuda.

Free Software

When the first computers were build software was commonly shared.
If you had just spent $1M on a computer it made sense to share your
software with others working on the same model. Collaboration with
others increased the value of the investment for all concerned,
including the manufacturers of the computers.

With the introduction of personal computers this model changed.
Suddenly, those developing software realised they could make vast sums
of money by selling the software separately to each computer owner.

Software was sold in binary form and the purchasers did not have the
source code necessary to modify that software for their own needs.
They had to rely on the software vendor to address their needs.

The free software movement began in the early 1980's with the
establishment of the GNU project.

Free software is defined by whether the recipient has the following
freedoms:

The freedom to run the program as you wish, for any purpose (freedom 0).

The freedom to study how the program works, and change it so it does
your computing as you wish (freedom 1). Access to the source code is
a precondition for this.

The freedom to redistribute copies so you can help your neighbour (freedom 2).

The freedom to distribute copies of your modified versions to others
(freedom 3). By doing this you can give the whole community a chance
to benefit from your changes. Access to the source code is a
precondition for this.

So the word free as about freedom not cost. Many prefer to use the
term libre software. There is no restriction preventing people
charging for free software, but the freedoms it comes with generally
mean it is also free to obtain, due to freedom 2.

The journey for free software over the last thirty years. Proprietary
software vendors have been very aggressive in attacks on the software
movement, such as Microsoft CEO, Steve Ballmer describing Linux as a
cancer in 2001.

Undeterred, the free software community has continued to develop
software in open, collaborative communities. Today free software is
ubiquitous. It runs the computers at the internet giants of social
media.

Over 30 years the communities developing software have refined their
tools and development methodologies to the point that it now dominates
the software world: Open Source has won

In fact, the real winners are the users of software, which in today's
world is much of humanity.

Today, Ballmer is no longer at Microsoft and the company is open
sourcing its products in an attempt to stay relevant.

Advantages of free software

There are many advantages to using free software. For a small island
like Bermuda these advantages can be even more significant.

Money spent on proprietary software is money leaving the island. In
return you get software without the freedom to experiment, examine and
discover how it works.

If you need support or help that requires changes to the software you
have no alternative but going back to the original vendor. In short,
you have vendor lock-in.

The local people managing this software are limited in what they can
do, due to not having the critical source code need to fully
understand the software.

When you use free software you empower your local people. They can
learn how the code actually works and customise it to their own needs.

Initially, you may not have the skills to do this, but over time you
can build up your skills.

Regardless, the fact that other users of the software also have the
freedom to work with it then anyone with the skills to understand that
software can offer you support.

When users encounter problems with the software, they have all the
tools they need to diagnose and fix those problems.

Hence with free software, instead of spending your budget on license
fees you can invest in local talent and build local expertise.

Disadvantages of free software

Most of the disadvantages of free software apply to proprietary
software too.

For example, some projects are not widely used. If you depend on a
package and are one of the few users of that package then you may end
up having the maintenance burden yourself.

The same problem arises with proprietary software. If you depend on a
commercial product that few others are using you run the risk of the
vendor dropping support or simply going out of business. Since you do
not have the source code, at this point there is little you can do if
you need to fix problems.

In short, just as you have to do due diligence with proprietary
software the same applies to free software. Generally, you will want
to stick to widely used software.

If you find yourself using some niche software others are not using
you may want to ask if you really need it: are you doing something
innovative that others are not doing, or have you missed a better
solution that others are using instead?

Free Culture Movement

Free software is just part of a wider Free Culture Movement.
Software can be considered as literature. The free culture movement
is now in every area of digital life:

Open Data

Whilst you can now find free software for pretty much any task you
might want to do, access to data is more of a challenge.

Legislation, such as Bermuda's Public Access To Information act have
helped to make government data freely available, but often data is not
easily accessible. Ideally, data should be searchable and freely
available in machine readable formats.

In many cases the obstacle is lack of resources in government
departments, in other cases there are fears about making the data
available.

Jurisdictions that have embraced open data have seen significant
benefits. For example, the City of Ottawa, Canada, has a full time
employee whose job is to promote open data. The city runs regular
events to educate citizens about the data sets that are available and
has run several competitions with prizes for innovative new uses of
the data.

Open Science

It is no coincidence that the Free Software Movement had its roots in
academia. Scientists have long known that science advances faster
when researchers collaborate and share their knowledge.

Over the past 25 years, as educational establishments have been
starved of resources they have turned to the commercial sector for
sponsorship and much scientific research, performed in educational
establishments has remained proprietary.

Over recent years there has been a strong movement back to open access
research and publishing. This movement now has critical mass and is a
driving force between the rapid innovation we are seeing in the world.

Those that are working in secret are increasingly finding themselves
unable to keep pace with work going on in the open. Indeed, the
challenge most researchers face is simply keeping pace with these
developments.

Free Culture in Bermuda

Bermuda's IT sector has been dominated by the proprietary software
sector for the past 20 years.

This has been the natural choice over this period. It is what the
rest of the world has also been using and Bermuda has naturally
followed the crowd.

Further, most proprietary products are in fact build on top of free
software.

The reinsurance industry has been a heavy user of proprietary software
and models. A typical reinsurer will spend $10M-$20M per annum on
proprietary software and models. The total spend in Bermuda is
probably of the order of $250M-$500M per annum. And software is tax
free in Bermuda.

These models are often black boxes which do not enable the users to
understand how they really work. The vendors are struggling to keep
pace with scientific developments. At the same time, their platforms
are making increasing use of free software.

The traditional reinsurers are coming under increasing pressure from new
entrants to the market who know how to leverage the free software
world and to use the growing tsunami of digital data.

There have been some notable examples of free software use. For
example Renaissance Reinsurance has been doing their in-house risk
simulations on the Linux platfrom since 1999. Further, many companies
are making use of free software tools such as the Python
programming language, widely used in science, finance and education.

Bermuda skills shortage

Bermudians have naturally sought training in the proprietary tools
that the main employers on the island are using. The result is that
there is a serious shortage of free software skills.

Bermuda has a highly educated population and its small size creates
excellent networking opportunities. Bermudians have a long history of
working together, you only have to look at the way the island
responded to the battering by hurricanes Fay and Gonzalo to see how
the island can work together when need arises.

What is missing is a central integrated strategy of joined up
government. Developing free software culture and collaboration across
government departments on free software projects can have a very
significant impact in this area.

There are many great initiatives to build a free culture community
here on the island, but achieving critical mass has been a huge
challenge. Initiatives by the government in partnership with
community members can have a huge impact.

Education

The Bermudian educational system is largely ignoring free culture at
present. Again, there are pockets of activity, such as teachers
giving short courses on the python language, but no coordinated
strategy.

School IT infrastructure is running on the proprietary Microsoft
platform. Due to security concerns, computers are increasingly locked
down and students do not have the freedom to explore the tools they
are using.

I have heard tales of teachers spending 30 minutes just to get their
students logged on to machines.

Technology in the classroom is a difficult to do well. Since technology
is advancing so rapidly, creating a curriculum that is relevant is a
huge challenge. For those doing the educating, keeping pace with all
the change whilst continuing to teach is a daunting task.

Creating and maintaining a computer lab is time consuming and
expensive. The result is often a sterile room full of locked down
machines that do not give students the freedom to learn through
experimentation and play. After 2-3 years use the lab becomes
obsolete as support is dropped for the software that is being used and
it is time to upgrade to new hardware and new software. And teachers
need to be re-trained.

Free software can run well on low powered, energy efficient
computers. Free software projects are driven by the community around
that project. There are new releases and upgrades. From time to time
there will be non-backward compatible changes as those running the
project decide it is time for a re-working of the code. However,
since it is the users of the project that are making these changes
there is usually excellent support to migrate to newer versions.

Further, there is nothing stopping you staying with the older
version. In general, free software projects have a much longer
lifespan than comparable commercial products.

Free software allows students to get a more fundamental understanding
of how computers and software work.

Educators at Cambridge university, were concerned that a new generation of
students, growing up in the internet age, nonetheless had a very poor
understanding of how computers actually work.

To address this the Raspberry Pi project was started. The aim was
to create a cheap, low power, computer that students could use to
learn the workings of a computer. The aim was to create something like
the BBC micro computer kit that my generation grew up with.

The raspberry pi allows students to attach a whole manner of sensors,
cameras, LED's and motors and write simple software to interact with
them. It allows the students to learn through experimentation and the
projects they pursue are only limited by their imagination.

Bermuda College

Bermuda College could be a focus of free software education in
Bermuda. An excellent example to follow would be the MAGIC centre
at the Rochester Institute of Technology.

MAGIC stands for Media, Arts, Games, Interactivity and Computing.
They offer a minor in open source. Students are introduced to the
open source world and shown how to find free software projects that
interest them and how to become involved.

I met a number of the students at this year's PyCon in Montreal,
Canada, as well as the programme leader, Stephen Jacobs. He was open
to the possibility of working with Bermuda College and even setting up
mentoring relationships between his students and those at Bermuda
College.

If Bermuda College can build up a thriving free software and free
culture programme it could help turn Bermuda into a thriving centre
for free software development.

Schools

As noted above, use of technology in schools is difficult to do well.

A particular challenge is training the educators. In many cases the
key is simply to create spaces where the children can play and
experiment with technology.

There are teachers in the Bermuda schools with interest in
technology and free software. It would be good to identify these
teachers and create opportunities for them to share their experiences
with each other and work on projects together.

Accessibility

Technology and software can be of considerable assistance to students
with special needs. Unfortunately, the technology is often very
expensive.

Free software has a role to play here to. Accessibility tools are
included out of the box, rather than as expensive add-ons. Being able
to install these assistive tools on as many computers as you like with
zero license key costs, not to mention not having to manage license
keys, ensures that they are more widely available and allow those with
special learning needs to work with the same machines as other
students.

Whilst some tools are not as feature rich as the commercial
alternatives many are good enough. Further, since it is free
software, you can always spend the money you would have spent on
license fees to pay a local developer to adapt the software to your
needs.

Government

The Bermuda government is currently running largely on proprietary
software.

In 2002 the City of Munich embarked on a project to move its
computers to the linux platform. It is an excellent project to study
for any jurisdiction that is considering a similar move.

Munich has had considerable financial savings as a result of the move
and will realise even greater savings in the future.

In 2015, this sort of migration is much easier to do and many of the
problems that Munich experienced have now been solved.

The main challenge for Bermuda would be in getting government IT
workers comfortable with the new technologies.

Change can be very stressful and threatening to those working in IT.
It takes years to develop skills and become productive. New
environments often mean these skills are no longer relevant.

Further, it is important to remember that IT managers in the past made
the best decisions they could based on the technology environment at
the time. A change of course should not be seen as a criticism of
these decisions, rather a recognition of the changes in the wider IT
world and the need for Bermuda to adapt in order to be able to take
advantage of all that free software can offer.

As in education, the key is to identify people in the government with
an interest in collaborative development and free software. This can
be a powerful way to increase collaboration between government
departments.

Governments everywhere are starved of resources. Working with peers
in other branches of government helps spread knowledge and creates
greater consistency across government.

Free software community

Many government and educational free software projects have their
roots in the informal communities of free software enthusiasts.

Often these enthusiasts are wary of bureaucratic control, believing
their projects should be driven by the interests of those contributing
to the projects rather than external interests.

At the same time, there are many government and education focussed
projects where the contributors are only too pleased to help their
local educators to take advantage of these projects.

The education system cannot hope to foster this sort of community all
on its own, rather it should endeavour to work with enthusiasts in the
wider community.

Educational establishments can help work with the community by
providing meeting rooms, hacker spaces, internet connections and
infrastructure to host projects.

Re-training the Bermuda workforce

Raising awareness of free culture is a key to getting more people
involved. Once free software community gets to a critical mass it
becomes self-sustaining, running regular meets and events where others
can be introduced to the subject.

If we can create spaces around the island where anyone with free time
can come to learn about this wonderful world of free culture then we
will have a powerful way to introduce these new skills to the Bermuda
work force.

The Python Community

The Python programming language is a particularly good fit to the
Bermuda environment.

Python is one of the easier languages to learn, is very well designed
and heavily used within education, science and finance.

Python has a vibrant, global, community which is vast, diverse and
aiming to grow.

The Python community has recognised this and been working very hard to
address the lack of diversity. In particular, it has made itself more
accessible to women.

I believe the Python Software Foundation would be very supportive to
any initiatives here in Bermuda to introduce python to black
Bermudians.

However, a first step in this direction is to build up our own local
community. Organising a small PyCon conference over the winter
months would be an excellent start.

If we can establish a regular conference then I am sure there will be
many overseas pythonistas only too happy to come to Bermuda to
share their knowledge and skills and help us on this journey.

Reinsurance Industry

The reinsurance industry is under strain at present. New entrants to
the market, a flood of new capital from hedge and pension funds, new
insurance linked securities are all pushing down premiums.

Companies are trying to cut costs through mergers.

The Bermuda reinsurers are all very much proprietary, Microsoft
shops. However, they are making increasing use of free software.

Many companies have python in their toolbox and have been using it for
many years. At least one reinsurer has been doing its in-house risk
simulations on Linux since 1999.

Others are starting to realise they need to be able to leverage free
software and open data, but are very short of employees with the
necessary skills and experience. Further, migrating from legacy
systems on proprietary platforms presents severe challenges. Again,
there may well be considerable resistance from IT staff and senior
management whose careers spanned the proprietary software era.

The larger companies also have offices in London, Zurich and Dublin.
All these cities have vibrant free software communities.

Tax regimes still make Bermuda an attractive location, but relying on
this alone to keep companies here is a risky strategy.

If Bermuda can build a vibrant free software culture and community,
focussing on education, science, environmentalism and finance then it
will be a very attractive place to do business. Free software skill
are in high demand world-wide.

Further, even if existing companies wither and die, there may be a new
generation of start ups, without the burden of legacy systems.

Environmental Research

Environmentalist interests are highly aligned with those of the
reinsurance industry. Both are concerned with modelling the impact of
human activity on natural hazards such as hurricane and earthquake.

Models to evaluate insurance risk can also be useful in assessing
environmental impact of climate strategies.

Bermuda is a delicate island ecosystem with a strong interest in
understanding the impacts of climate change. But, as a small island
the onus is on Bermudians to study their own environment and collect
data to understand how it is changing.

Free culture creates the opportunity to collaborate with those doing
similar work in other small island communities and will likely be
critical to ensuring Bermudian interests are addressed.

Sustainability

As an isolated island community, sustainability was critical to
Bermudian's survival for hundreds of years. As communications have
improved it has depended more on trade and has become much less
sustainable.

There are many opportunities to redress the balance. Perhaps, with
robots and algorithms freeing up time people will devote more of their
time to their local communities.

Renewable energy

Bermuda has very high energy costs whilst having an abundant supply of
renewable energy: solar, wind and wave.

Solar is very active on the island, but will present challenges for
BELCO and residents alike.

As more homeowners install solar panels BELCO will be faced with
maintaining the same grid with less income. At current levels of
adoption there is little problem.

As adoption increases, this will likely increase costs for the most
vulnerable on the island who can afford the costs of installing solar
panels.

Societal change

The move to free software is reducing business costs and increasing
collaboration amongst organisations.

Free software gives its users the power to experiment with that
software, to scratch an itch, to investigate an idea. It is greatly
empowering.

Whereas in the past you might have had to spend thousands of dollars
to obtain the tools to investigate an idea, now those tools are freely
available.

With the accompanying data tsunami individuals are further empowered
to explore their ideas.

Raising awareness of free software and creating understanding of how
it empowers individuals is critical to creating societal change,
creating greater community cohesion and sustainability.

Public Transport

Free software and open data have made significant contributions to
public transport.

Cities that have opened up GPS data giving current locations of public
transport fleets have seen increased usage. Further, with better data
collected on usage they have been able to optimise timetables and
reduce costs.

Computer models can also be developed to evaluate the benefits of new
transport strategies.

Transport is critical to the visitor experience here in Bermuda.

Tourism

Most free large free software projects have vibrant communities.
Whilst the development methods and tools support work that is
scattered across the globe most projects find conferences, coding
sprints and educational gatherings give their projects a considerable
boost.

If we can develop free culture community here in Bermuda then members
of those communities will want to come here to work with us.

Although Bermuda is an expensive place to visit it can be made more
affordable. Flights to the island are no more expensive than flights
across North America. There are many properties available for short
term rental.

Further, winter is a natural time for such conferences. When it
is -25C on the east coast, +20C in Bermuda is a very attractive
option.

As an example, the annual Python conference, this year held in
Montreal, attracted 3000 free software enthusiasts to the city.

Sport

Sport is an important part of Bermudian life. The sports clubs are
yet another location where free culture can be introduced to
Bermudians.

For example, the German soccer team's success in the last World Cup
was in part due to the team of data scientists that they had analysing
game data.

The Bermuda national soccer team is enjoying success in its World Cup
qualifying campaign. It would be good to build on this success by
introducing data analysis to the Bermuda game, working with free
software and home grown technology to enable Bermudians to learn about
this technology whilst enjoying the sport and helping Bermudians
succeed on the world stage.

America's Cup

The America's Cup is a technology feast. The main sponsor of the
defending Team USA is Oracle.

Oracle is another hugely successful proprietary software company
that has had a complex and not always friendly relationship with the
free software world. Like Microsoft, it is trying to adapt to the new
world. Interestingly, Oracle is sponsoring a raspberry pi weather
station project for schools.

The America's Cup is an opportunity to showcase the island to all
those that will visit as a result of the sailing.

Further, it gives an opportunity to teach our students about
technology. We can have students build model boats, guided by
software they have written for a raspberry pi, powered by a small
solar panel. Imagine something along the lines of a Non-Mariners race
for model boats.

The America's Cup Committee has a huge challenge to build all the
infrastructure in time for the event.

If we can foster free culture community here in Bermuda then the
America's Cup can act as a focus for community projects.

The free software community can work with the organisers to build IT
infrastructure fit for the 21st century. Infrastructure which will be
an asset to the island long after the yaughts have gone.

Privacy and information security

Information security, or cyber security as it is more popularly
known has been very much in the news of late.

It is now quite clear that securing data on computers against a
determined attacker is a close to impossible task with current
technology.

Every day we hear stories of massive leaks of very personal data, such
as this breach at the Office of Personnel Management.

Bermudians have a much better and more nuanced appreciation of privacy
issues than those living in large cities. Bermudians are acutely
aware of the importance of privacy and how to respect other people's
confidences.

There is an opportunity here for Bermuda to do pioneering work on data
security and provide a safe haven for data, respecting people's
privacy.

These massive data breaches also demonstrate the costs associated with
gathering and storing large amounts of sensitive personal data and may
well further drive the move to open data. Since the data will likely
leak out anyway, why not share it with everyone?

Information security and privacy concerns may slow down adoption of
new technologies due to a number of factors:

public fears about loss of privacy

concerns about security of devices

locking down of computers in the workplace reducing efficiency.

As a small jurisdiction Bermuda can be a test environment for new,
innovative security strategies, building its own, internal, freely
accessible networks.

It should be noted, however, that currently data on corporate and
government computers in Bermuda is highly vulnerable to determined
attackers.

Bitcoin and crypto-currencies

Bitcoin is an innovative payment system often referred to as a
crypto-currency. It uses advanced cryptographic techniques to
authenticate transactions.

It has some characteristics in common with Paypal, although is
fundamentally different in a number of key respects.

It is a distributed system without a central authority. Bitcoins are
awarded to users which offer computing resources for payment
processing work.

It is becoming mainstream and has the potential to be a hugely
disruptive technology. It was the subject of one of the talks at last
year's Bermuda TEDx event.

Anyone can create a bitcoin wallet and then use it to make or receive
payments to others.

In the current Bermuda job market, with rising unemployment and
rising numbers of Bermudians requiring two or three minimum wage jobs
to keep their heads above water there are signs of an emerging barter
economy. Bermudians are finding it is better use of their time to
help each other out than to take such jobs.

Bitcoin is a currency that allows individuals to trade on their
reputation in a global environment.

Free software provides Bermudians with the tools they require to offer
their services globally and bitcoin may well support this activity.

For example, a musician could host their digital music on a website
built using free software and accept donations in bitcoin.

Bermuda has much musical and artistic talent, raising awareness
globally can only help tourist numbers.

Conclusions

The dramatic pace of technological and social change in the world is
creating stress and challenges across the globe.

Bermuda, as a small island community that has traditionally been slow
to change has unique challenges.

The very free culture movement that is driving much of this change is
largely untapped here in Bermuda.

This presents a massive opportunity for Bermuda to empower its
citizens by introducing them to this magical world of opportunity.